Recently in academics Category

Finals are over! Finally! Man, what a week. I think they went pretty well for the most part, even though I kind of messed up on the oral expression exam, which is so frustrating because I did much better on the practice test. Oh well, that's life. The most awful exam, ironically, was for English Lit. It was one of the hardest exams I've taken in my entire life. It was a four-hour in-class commentary on a subject we were given at the beginning of the exam, on Dickens' Great Expectations. You can't just whip out an American college style five paragraph essay; the French commentary format is really strict and structured and you have to follow this specific sequence of analytical steps. It was horrible, I had to take the whole four hours and then wanted to throw up afterwards. I think I did OK, but still. Luckily I will probably never have to do that again. From now on, finals at PSU are going to be a cakewalk.

Going by the results of the practice exam today, I am probably going to do quite well on my oral expression final. That is hella reassuring, and surprising, since speaking has never been my strong point, although it is kind of cheating because we have 15 minutes to prepare notes, which we can then use during the exam. Still though, it's nice to know I can come up with a coherent, structured argument on a random subject in 15 minutes. And if I can do it in French, I should be able to do it in English as well. Hooray for skills! Maybe I will get a job someday after all!

Something that is very good: vin chaud, or hot wine. It is basically like mulled wine in the States, except that it is delicious. It makes you feel all warm and happy.

Something that is very bad: naming a perfume "Very Irresistable." It seems like you're adding a qualifier to a superlative, and that's just wrong. Plus, I smelled it in a magazine, and it was not irresistable.